This invention relates to a method and apparatus for quenching hot coke discharged from a coke oven buttery.
Instead of quenching hot coke by wet type method of quenching, it is a recent trend to cool the hot coke with cold inert gas. According to such dry type method of quenching it is possible to efficiently cool the hot coke without producing a large amount of smoke and steam thus preventing the problem of public hazard. Moreover, as it is possible to recover the heat of the gas utilized for the cooling, thereby increasing thermal efficiency. However, when the cooling gas is repeatedly used its composition changes so that it is necessary to add a predetermined amount of nitrogen gas or air at a definite interval for adjusting the composition of the cooling gas. However, with this method it is not always possible to correctly readjust the composition. Moreover, such method not only requires to use a large amount of nitrogen gas and but also the yield of coke is low. In certain cases, there is a danger of explosion and the operator is requested to constantly watch the operating condition and manipulate a number of valves.